Worth It
by Ryah Ignis
Summary: At the end of the Battle of Hogwarts, there isn't much for anyone to do but pick up the peices. When Draco is sent to inspect the partially destroyed sixth floor, he might get a bit more than he bargained for. A series of unconnected Drastoria one-shots. Chapter two: Christmas With The Inlaws
1. Chapter 1

**Competition: The Ultimate Death Eater Contest by Miss Bella Riddle of HPFC**

**Word Count: 1,190**

**Prompt: Lucius or Draco Malfoy #5 "Sometimes you have to get your hands dirty"**

It was over—the war was finally over, but Draco Malfoy didn't feel much like celebrating. Maybe it was the fact that everyone was glaring at him as if he was some sort of traitor, (which, mind you, he was) or maybe it was the fact that one of his best friends since he was a toddler was dead. Whatever it was, when everyone else was in the Great Hall mourning loved ones or toasting the end of Voldemort, Draco was not joining in the festivities. Professor McGonagall was overseeing the whole mess, trying to distribute the St. Mungos Healers that had just arrived to the people who needed attention and directing people who were looking for family members or friends to Luna Lovegood, who had a list of every participant in the battle that was known. Finally, Draco drew the remains of his bravery together and walked up to his professor.

"What can I do to help?"

She looked down at him skeptically through her wire rimmed glasses that she had somehow retained throughout the fight. The sharp look wasn't exactly fair—he was trying to help after all.

"We are still missing several students," she said, choosing her words carefully as if afraid that he would whip out his wand and start killing the injured people lying propped up next to her.

"Do you want me to look?"

That look again. Draco sighed and inwardly rolled his eyes.

"The sixth floor corridor is in ruins."

Draco walked out of the Hall, ignoring the disparaging looks that were thrown his way by his classmates. Even if he had never managed to do it before, he was going to do something good and then they'd all see. Draco picked his way through the Entrance Hall, trying his best not to remember Bellatrix cursing her helpless victim there only hours before. It felt like years ago that he had gone to sleep in the Slytherin Common Room. Part of the staircase had been torn apart completely, so Draco had to leap over a two foot gap. It certainly hadn't been the most frightening thing he had been required to do over the past few hours.

He continued on his way past paintings that had been blown out of their frames, the owners moaning in the portrait next door. The door to the Charms room was hanging by one hinge, and the blackboard was splattered with a dark substance that Draco had no desire to get any closer to. Up and up he walked, occasionally forced to balance, gymnast-like on narrow edges that had once served as stairs.

Finally he reached the sixth floor. McGonagall had been right: it was a wreck. Draco could see the dawn, fiery on the horizon thorugh a gaping hole in the castle wall. Merlin knew what kind of spell would have had to be cast to have destroyed the magical protections.

"Hello?" he called.

There was nothing. Draco was beginning to think that McGonagall had sent him on a wild goose chase when a faint voice answered him.

"Help!"

Draco stumbled through the rubble towards the sound of the young girl's voice. It had come from the odd arch structure that had been formed by part of the

Ceiling when it had collapsed and a part of the wall. Draco pointed his wand at the ruins and flicked it expertly.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" he said.

Nothing happened.

"Don't you think I tried that already?" came the slightly snarky reply from underneath the trap.

"Well, what do you want me to do?" he snapped.

"Try to shift some of the rubble."

Draco sighed and got down on his knees next it and began to move the wreckage. It was tiresome work, and after a few minutes, his arms began to feel as if he had been doing it for days. He didn't seem to be making much progress. The trapped girl was silent; perhaps she was dead. Shaking his head of this perturbing thought, Draco continued his labor.

"Thank Merlin," said the girl when her head at last came into view, smeared with blood, and covered in bruises and dust older then she was.

Draco had wormed his way into the crevice where she was and found that he could stand up so long as he bent over.

She was clenching her jaw as if in pain, but Draco supposed that she was pretty enough. She had brown hair that was powdered white from all the grime from when the corridor had exploded and brown eyes.

"Are you all right?" he asked.

"Oh, I don't know. Take a look at my leg, would you?"

Draco grimaced at the sight. Her leg from the calf down was imprisoned beneath a large boulder. At least that explained why she hadn't dug herself out. She still had her wand out, though.

"I've been trying to numb my leg a bit, but I don't want to accidentally paralyze myself or something. I keep calling for Colin to help me out, but he probably escaped, and left me behind. I'm going to get him for that."

"I don't think I can levitate the rock," he said, inspecting it from all angles. He didn't want to be the one to tell her that Colin Creevey was among those motionless in the Great Hall. She'd find out soon enough anyway.

"Wonderful deduction," she said dryly.

Draco muttered a spell under his breath. A second later, he picked up the rock and set it down away from her leg. Featherlight charms really were useful. She breathed a sigh of relief and closed her eyes, unwilling to see it. Draco wished he could too. It was so horribly broken that Muggle doctors wouldn't have been able to fix it.

"Let's get you down to Madam Pomfrey," he said.

There didn't seem to be a way to get her to walk, so Draco cast the Featherlight charm again and scooped her up as easily as he would a child. She wasn't much more than a child, he noted, but then again, neither was he.

"What's your name?" he asked.

She smiled at him. "Astoria Greengrass."

They made their painstaking way downstairs. Draco had to be careful not to drop his charge, so it was twice as difficult. Astoria didn't shut her mouth once on the way. She asked questions about Voldemort, what he'd looked like, and a blow-by-blow account of the duel between him and Harry. The little details Draco had gleaned from all the celebrating (he hadn't been there for the duel) were all picked over. She was very curious, to say the least.

When at last they reached the Great Hall, Madam Pomfrey fixed Astoria's leg in a few minutes. She bounced up, good as new.

"Thank you," she said, leaning over to kiss him on the cheek.

She disappeared into the crowd towards certain heartbreak. Draco smiled after her. Yes, getting his hands dirty was definitely worth it.

**Reviews are always appreiciated! Thanks for reading.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Competition: Kitkat's Canon Ship's Competition**

**Pairing: Draco/Astoria**

**Word count: 911**

**Won third place!**

Standing in the overcrowded foyer of the Greengrass family's house, Draco has never felt more out of place in his life. He should probably feel more comfortable—Astoria is his bride to be after all, but the decorations glistening on every available surface seemed to be pressing in on his chest. Holly berries were enchanted to grow along the walls along with their prickly counterparts, and there were snowmen that lit up and did a little jig when Draco looked at them. Astoria rounded the corner bearing an armful of tinsel for the already bedecked tree.

"You're early," she commented, kissing him on the cheek. "Mistletoe."

Draco looked up to see the spindly plant suspended above his head and sighed.

"Are you ready to go?"

"Yeah, just one minute. Daddy, I'm leaving so if you could get the tinsel…"

"Of course," said Burnel, coming down the wide staircase and planting a kiss on his daughter's forehead. "Don't be too late, you hear? Remember your manners—"

"Dad, I'm about to get married, I don't think that you need to tell me that."

"Still," Burnel said, "you'll always be my little girl."

Astoria took Draco's arm and he twisted away into darkness with her at his side. When they arrived outside the manor, Astoria stumbled a bit on impact.

"Sorry. I'm still not quite used to Apparition. Mum always insisted that I use Floo Powder as a kid, and I've only been able to Apperate for a while now. I suppose I don't have the temperament for it."

Draco led her up the path, skirting the peacocks that were nibbling at the seed his father had left out for them. (Even at the age of twenty-three, he couldn't stand the creatures.)

"We are never going to own peacocks," he told Astoria.

She giggled. "Where did that thought come from?"

"I hate them."

Astoria laughed again and took his hand, swinging her arm back and forth and taking his with it. It was moments like these that he knew why she was the one for him.

She looked surprised as they walked up to the house. It took Draco a second to realize she was searching for something, her eyes flicking back and forth curiously like a cat's eyes hooked on a string of yarn. Then he realized. The Greengrass house had been covered in decorations, but the manor lacked the tiniest bit of Christmas cheer.

He pulled open the front door, and instead of walking into the dining room to announce his and his fiancé's presence, he headed up to the attic. Inquisitive as always, Astoria followed him. Draco flicked his wand at the ceiling, causing a ladder to fall. Without any questions, Astoria mounted it and climbed up. Draco followed hurriedly. They'd placed all the things they'd inherited from Bellatrix without looking at any of them up there, and he wasn't sure what Dark objects might be there. The very last thing he needed was the girl he was to be married to getting killed in his attic. What would the Ministry make of that?

"You should probably get rid of this," Astoria said, pulling a book out of a dust-covered shelf.

The cover read _Magick Moste Evill_. Draco grimaced slightly. He really had to clean this place out.

"Yeah. Chuck in in this box," he said, scooping up a black box from the floor.

Something in the box screeched in protest. Astoria looked at it in surprise, and then threw the book inside. The animal (or whatever it was: you never knew with Bellatrix) gave a small whimper. Draco resolved to burn the box as soon as possible, maybe after letting the creature go in the garden.

"Here it is!" Astoria sang, digging a box labeled _Decorations _in his mother's loopy handwriting out of a pile of old baby clothes.

Astoria looked disdainfully down her nose at the box.

"It's practically empty," she said, withdrawing a limp piece of tinsel whose sparkle was almost gone.

"Well, we haven't used it since…before."

Before needed no explanation. Before the war that had ended normal, rocked the status quo. The war that had given him Astoria.

Astoria brightened considerably. "We can fix it, easy."

She waved her wand at the tinsel, a sparkle coming into the wilted decoration. Then she flicked her wand again, doubling the amount until she had a long string that was twice as long as she was tall. They did the same with the rest of the decorations, sprucing up what was needed and making it bigger or brighter. Astoria's smile grew as they headed back down with the boxes in hand.

They met his parents in the drawing room. Lucius looked slightly like a bird backed into a corner by a cat, but Narcissa had a smile playing on her lips at the sight of Astoria, covered in dust and holding a box.

"We thought we'd decorate," she said brightly.

Without waiting for a reply, she skipped off into the drawing room. Lucius looked after her with raised eyebrows. Narcissa only smiled. Apparently, she approved of his choice.

"You know, it's never too late to renew that marriage contract with the Parkinsons," he said wistfully.

Draco shook his head firmly and followed Astoria into the drawing room. They had decorations to put up.

"Astoria?"

She turned around, that glowing look that she always wore, even in the midst of war and chaos on her face.

"Don't ever change."

**Please do me a favor and review. First attempt at fluff, I'm not sure how it went. **


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